Friday, April 12, 2013

Spirits Contained In Orbs

The seemingly single biggest controversy in paranormal investigating is whether orbs in photos are spirits.Some investigators believe that 90% of orbs are paranormal!

Orbs are believed to be the energy form of spirits. Some seem to have the perception of free movement, some have comet-like tails, differ in size, and have different colors. No seems to know where this started, but the lore has cemented itself in the paranormal community.

Now due to the extremely affordable price of a point and shoot digital cameras, most people use these on investigations. Usually, investigators would have no issues with these being used. Usually. When someone sends a seasoned investigator a photo of orbs or tries to display photos with orbs as evidence the first thing that is asked is "What Kind of camera was this taken with?" Well because of the layout and size of the camera, point and shoot cameras tend to have a lot more orbs than say, an SLR. On a point and shoot, the flash source is no more than a few degrees away from the axis of the camera lens. This causes the object to be brightly light but way out of focus, resulting in a semi-transparent whitish circle. If the flash or another light source is significantly off of the axis of the lens, you won't get nearly as much light reflected right straight back to the camera. If the object is within the depth of field, it will be in focus and very small, and probably not noticeable. If the object is not very close to the camera, again it won't pick up enough light from the flash. It also has to do with the quality of the optics in the camera. Take a picture side by side with a point and shoot and an SLR camera. The difference is astounding.

Regardless of the source, orbs should always try to be debunked first and not just taken as paranormal. Remember there is no real evidence that orbs are spirits or ghosts, so as paranormal investigators, it is our duty to the field to do our best to find the truth. Now I'm not saying that everything a point and shoot captures are dust or moisture in the air. Not at all. Not everything in this world is explainable.

Now most people do accept this when they hear about it, but again there are those that just get angry and defensive. I have been told by individuals that they believe 90% of orbs captured to be paranormal even after all the evidence to the contrary! Well, its not scientific fact either way so I leave it at that. I can't prove that orbs are not spirits, and they cant prove they So let's agree to disagree.

Now investigators can hear everyone saying "But there's a face in mine!" The answer is usually simple. Pareidolia. Simply put, matrixing. More details in a follow-up post.

Orb colors

Where and why people associate the typical emotional colors with orbs is unknown. By now everyone has seen a mood ring, as it seems to explain why there are different colors with orbs they've just copied that list of colors and their means and used on orbs. Maybe they even took it from Pagan religions who burn colored candles.

Here is the list of colors and their meanings:

Black: Malevolent

Blue (dark): Shy spirit

Blue (light): Tranquil, Peace

Blue (medium): Protection

Brown: Danger or earthbound

Gold: Angelic, unconditional love

Green: Healing Orb or spirit

Lavender: Messenger from God

Orange: Protection, forgiveness

Peach: Spirit sent to comfort you

Pink: Accepting spirit

Purple: Orb of information

Red: Anger or passion

Silver: Messenger

Violet: Guide for spiritual matters

White: Protection of holy light and power

Yellow: Warning

There are going to be varying degrees of color charts depending on where you look. Seems like not everyone can appear to agree on what each color means. There are those who think that using a color chart like this to explain orbs is an accepted practice within the paranormal community. If this is true, no wonder a lot of people think were quacks for doing this.

Ever wonder if the orbs, in fact, a giant mood ring?.Changing colors on moods? Could they possibly be mad we took the idea of mood rings and their color schemes from them? Maybe they are just mad or sad because they can't listen to the Cure anymore? Granted if this were the case most of us would be mad if someone was playing the Cure. Maybe country music then? At that point are we opening, even more, doors asking if they have ears? Can they truly hear the country music playing? Could they be offended by the clothes we wear when we investigate? Wearing those horrible group T-shirts most could understand.

If investigators, hobbyists, or professional can band together long enough to establish what is acceptable evidence, we can go along way to making this field legit.